Is it true that the famous photograph shows Stepan Bandera in a Nazi uniform?

A photograph of a group of German officers from the Third Reich is popular on the Internet. Many sources claim that the center of the photograph is Ukrainian politician Stepan Bandera. We checked if this is true.

A group photograph (often with the caption ““Fighter against the Germans” S. Bandera. Photo of Bandera banned in Ukraine”) was distributed over the years on Russian-language information sites (RT, Sputnik, "Moldavian Vedomosti", Sibnet.ru, "Peekaboo", "Poems.ru" , Fishki.net, Don't Panic, V social networks, as well as in a number of European sources, including Polish And Italian resources.

The military-political activity of the Ukrainian nationalist figure Stepan Bandera during the Second World War often becomes the subject of controversy and speculation. In September 1939, after the German attack on Poland, then still a relatively ordinary member of the Organization of Ukrainian Nationalists (OUN), Bandera was released from imprisonment in the Brest Fortress, which he served for organizing the murder of the Polish Minister of Internal Affairs Bronislaw Peracki. A few days later, the Germans handed over Brest to Soviet troops, and by that time Bandera himself had already returned to Lvov, after which he went to Eastern Europe to establish further activities of the OUN. The main direction of the organization’s work was now the fight against the Soviet regime, which at that time had established control over the west of Ukraine.

By the beginning of 1940, a split had emerged in the OUN, since Bandera and his closest supporters considered the actions of the leadership insufficient and demanded more active preparations for an uprising in the region. And although the revolutionary wing of the OUN, led by Stepan Bandera (which in April 1941 declared itself the only legitimate one in the organization) supported the German offensive in June, it soon turned out that the Bandera goals of creating an independent Ukraine did not suit the Germans at all. June 30 was read “Act of Proclamation of the Ukrainian State”, in response to which the German occupation authorities arrested the top of the OUN, sent Bandera first to Berlin under house arrest, and after a series of interrogations - to the Sachsenhausen concentration camp. Bandera stayed there until the fall of 1944, when the Germans’ affairs on the Eastern Front deteriorated significantly and they needed the help of any possible opponents of Soviet power. However, the SS leadership failed to reach an agreement with the released Bandera - he still cherished the dream of a completely independent Ukraine and refused both from the idea of ​​future subordination and from temporary cooperation with the ethnically Russian general Vlasov. Information differs about Bandera's further activities in freedom until the spring of 1945, but not a single serious source claims that he officially joined any German armed forces, much less received an officer rank and state awards.

Who then is depicted in the center of the photograph? Before us is quite different in appearance from Stepan Bandera Reinhard Gehlen, Wehrmacht officer (from April 1945 - Lieutenant General), who years later would become the founder of the German Federal Intelligence Service. Nothing connects him with Stepan Bandera except a theoretically possible acquaintance in connection with his professional activities. But the photo that went viral on the Internet has nothing to do with the OUN leader. It was made in 1943 on the territory of modern Poland, and on the Bundesarchiv website all 35 people depicted on it named by name.

Cover image: Bundesarchiv.

Fake

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